Across the Fence: National Days

Have you ever pondered what a national day is? By definition, it is a day that marks the nationhood of a nation or a state. The other day I looked it up on Wikipedia. Including a map that shows two nations that, to my utter surprise, don’t have any – the United Kingdom and Denmark. Some nations have entirely different reasons for national days – a king’s birthday, coronation day, a Saint. But wait – haven’t we all heard of so many more national, even international days?!

Indeed, there are entire websites dedicated to all kinds of reasons and purposes that something should be celebrated. https://nationaltoday.com/ is one of them. As I’m writing this, it is National Chili Day, no kidding. And you wouldn’t believe how much there is to find out just about this one item! Such as when the original recipe was probably brought over (in the 18th century, surprise, surprise!) to the earliest recipe that describes the dish but doesn’t call it chili yet in 1828, and Texas declaring it its official dish in 1977. An agency has done a survey that found out that only five percent of all Americans don’t like chili. That, at 31 %, cheese is the most favorite topping. And that ten percent of all Americans have a chili recipe that they keep a secret. That 52 % of all Americans prefer to eat their chili out of a bowl. And you can even find tips how to celebrate the day, e. g. with a chili tasting tour from restaurant to restaurant. Well, that was definitely an idea that was hatched before 2020. Even the discussion of beans or no beans is mentioned. So, who isn’t in a mood for chili by now? Okay, the above-mentioned five percent.

As most of you will be reading this in their Saturday edition of The Suburban Times, you might feel curious about what national day February 27 is. According to the above website it is International Polar Bear Day, National Pokemon Day, National Protein Day, and National Strawberry Day. The latter makes no real sense to me since you have to show me where the strawberries are even as much as just blossoming all over the nation in February. But since you can create and buy your own national day according to the website, I’m not astonished at all. Maybe it was somebody’s birthday gift to somebody else. Or it was simply attached to sometime in February, as the strawberry is a symbol for Venus, and February is the month of love. But wait! Would this mean that all the other eleven months of the year aren’t months of love?!

Clearly, national days may or may not come with a specific meaning to everybody. They are fun days to reflect upon a specific topic. They might be reminders to take better care of a philosophical or an environmental issue. And if we are reading up on one of the topics, we even might get some deeper knowledge about it. It might come in handy the next time we are watching Jeopardy. Or not. Dr. Patt Schwab has even written a book titled “Obscure Holiday Guide” – and apparently it is so obscure that I’m not even able to find it on Amazon. Which is my fault. But it is definitely out there!

I think that these national days or holidays are simply out there to lift our spirits when we have difficulty finding a reason for celebrating our own big and little moments in a day. I have to admit that I find plenty of topics each and every day to celebrate something with a happy dance or a smile. Take my yesterday (which was last Wednesday, now that you are reading this): an extremely beautiful red robin at our bird feeder, a fun lunch with my teleworking husband, finishing the first draft of my seventh Wycliff novel, solving an extremely difficult area in an insanely difficult and gorgeous jigsaw puzzle, and a delicious pasta dish that I took from a Jamie Oliver cookbook.

Do you celebrate your big or little moments in a day at least with a smile? If not, find inspiration in the national days. And create your own moments!

The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.